Geneva – Commenting on a public outcry over signs that urged Jews at a Swiss hotel to shower, a state lawmaker from Geneva said “Israel should apologize for its excessive tolerance of ultra-Orthodox Jews who prevent peace in Palestine.”
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Roger Deneys, a Socialist representative at the Grand Council of Geneva, made the assertion on Facebook Wednesday about the posting of a signs over the weekend at Paradise Apartments in Arosa, some 80 miles southeast of Zurich. Management urged “Jewish guests” to shower before entering the pool and access a refrigerator at set times.
The posting of the signs generated a storm of criticism, including by the Simon Wiesenthal Center, which had the hotel removed from the online reservations service Booking.com, and by the Israel, whose deputy foreign minister, Tzipi Hotovely, said in a statement that the incident reflected the prevalence of anti-Semitic sentiments in Europe at large.
Deneys deleted his comment shortly after posting it and apologized for having written “nonsense,” the online edition of the Swiss Le Matin daily reported Thursday.
He told Le Matin he had reacted “too fast and stupidly” because he was angry at Hotovely for her “disingenuous reaction, in which she demanded apologies from Switzerland.” He added: “I had no intention of discriminating against the Jewish community.”
In a statement to the media, Hotovely’s office did not include a demand Swiss authorities apologize for the incident. She did however urge the prosecution of the person responsible for posting the signs. Her statement said that Israel’s ambassador to Switzerland requested the Swiss foreign ministry deplore the hotel staff’s actions.
Ruth Thomann, who runs the hotel, told JTA Monday that she removed the signs shortly after they were put up over the weekend. She said she meant no offense to Jews and that she merely sought to convey information relevant only to the Jewish guests.
Thomann said only the Jewish guests were entering the pool without showering first while wearing t-shirts and they alone were allowed, as a courtesy, to put food in the staff’s refrigerator.
“I may have selected the wrong words; the signs should have been addressed to all the guests instead of Jewish ones,” she added.
The sign about the pool read: “To our Jewish Guests: Please take a shower before you go swimming and although after swimming. If you break the rules, I’m forced to cloes the swimming pool for you.” [sic]
The sign about the refrigerator read: “To our Jewish guests: You are allowed to approach the fridge between the hours: 10.00-11.00 in the morning and 16.30-17.30 in the evening. I hope you understand that our team does not like to be disturbed every time.”
Enough of this fake news story already.
Did this Nazi ever think of telling the Muslims to stop killing people? Why do we tolerate such trash?
This guy is classic alt left
What can one expect from the Swiss? The Swiss, through their banks, funded the Nazi war machine, during World War Two. After the war, and for over 50 years, the Swiss withheld life insurance benefits to Jews, whose relatives were killed in the Shoah. The Swiss were taken to court, and agreed to a settlement worth billions. However,it took a long time; behind the scenes, the Swiss were blasting what they called “the pressure from New York Jews”.
Hey, Mrs. Tzipi Hotovely! Please, give it a rest, and back off these Swiss Goyim. Show some understanding. This has already been blown all out of proportion, and at this point some one of us or some group or institution should make public amends with the hotel, apologize for tumult, maybe pay them some compensation for any effects of the bad publicity, maybe commit to some minimum of future booking. As someone who as a young man used to travel a lot among the Goyim, I find this parsha extremely embarrassing.
Mechanchim need to teach their students how to behave around Goyim, and how to go about the business of never conforming to Goyim. What seems to be happening is that they are being lazy, and just teaching the baseline default behavior of “never conform”, without teaching any of the tricks of how to not conform while not justifying labels like undesirable, trouble-maker, nuisance, bad-mannered, impolite, public health hazard, etc.
Thank you Israel for poking your nose where not needed, we couldn’t do without you,
Last time i read, Israel wasn’t especially tolerant to Chareidim,
Just do what you’re good at,
This has nothing to do with Israel, and everything to do with the Swiss being intolerant anti-Semites, as proven by the posted sign and by the Swiss politician’s racist, arrogant comment on social media. Sounds like the Swiss love alt-left, neo-Nazi politicians.
Go o any men’s mikvoh and you will find the same sign instructing bathers to shower BEFORE entering the mikvoh. Anti-Semitism? No! Just common decency that sadly many of our chaverim seem to be missing.
Shalom Al Yisroel
Yoely, how many goyim toivel in any Satmar mikve? No need to use the word “Jewish” there. I have been in Arosa and the behaviour of many of the Chassidim there is too embarassing for words. I am not just talking about jumping into a swimming pool withotu showering, ask the workers at some of the bars and cigar clubs about their Jewish night time guests.